A group of researchers at MIT has created a new material that expands and contracts when exposed to different temperatures.
The Active Auxetic material, developed at MIT’s Self-Assembly Lab, shares some of the same properties as typical auxetic surfaces, which expand or shrink in all directions when stretched or compressed. A normal material only thins in the direction it is pulled.
However, the group of researchers – made up of Athina Papadopoulou, Hannah Lienhard, Jared Laucks and Skylar Tibbits – has taken this technology further by making the material temperature-responsive.
The material does not require human action to activate, but instead responds to a stimulus automatically.
The team particularly envisage the material being used in fashion design, where it would act as a second skin – tightening in cold weather to keep warmth inside, and loosening up in hot weather to let the air in.
The material is similar to the “Bio-Skin” also designed by a team from MIT’s Media Lab, who used bacteria to create a fabric that peels back in reaction to sweat and humidity.
The Self-Assembly Lab is a cross-disciplinary research group that is led by Tibbits and Laucks. It explores and creates new technologies and processes related to construction, manufacturing, product assembly and performance.
Previously, the group created a towering architectural structure, built by a robotic arm using nothing but gravel and thread.
Source: dezeen.com
